Just The Stats: Area Teens Use of Social Media

In October 2016 I read an article concerning the top apps used by teens. Admittedly, this article was based on a more global view of teens rather than what teens in Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky are doing. Thinking that our little corner of the world doesn’t always reflect the universal popular culture, we set out to survey area teens as to how they use social media. The results were certainly eye-opening.

As Elise Moreau stated in her LIFEWIRE article: “Social networking isn’t what it was just 10 years ago. Gone are the days when MySpace and Facebook ruled the web. Now, practically everyone’s gone mobile, with real-time photo and video sharing becoming the big trend that people are most excited about — especially teenagers.

Facebook has admittedly confessed that it has struggled to keep its younger users engaged and excited to interact on its platform, despite once being the ultimate go-to social network of choice for young people just a few years ago. So where are they now?”

Well… although there are some common apps that seem to bridge the oceans — the reality is that every school will adopt their use of apps a bit differently. Additionally, they are constantly changing. For example: In August, the majority of teens were using Pokemon Go. In January 2017 — not so much.

So let’s take a look:

Globally, the top 10 social media apps listed by Lifewire in October, 2016 are:

Although almost every middle and high school that we surveyed had students using Whatsapp, Vine, Tumblr, Pheed, AskFm and Twitter — the percentages were almost always very low. Moreover, it is also interesting to note that there can be a significant difference between what 14 year olds do on social media compared to students that are just a few years older or younger.

For example: Musical.ly and Live.ly are used by as many as 50% of middle school students in our coverage area. However, only a small percentage of high school students use either of those apps.

Although the results of our survey are not yet complete, today we are sharing a glimpse of our data relating to area high school students that are using social media. Keep in mind, if you look at individual schools, you’ll sometimes see significant differences in apps that are being used.